There was a heap of slime essence where Cory had burned all the slime. We could take approximately ten per person, so Hylli, Cory, and I would all receive high scores. Looking at the clock, it seemed we still had twenty minutes left.
Cory slowly released the floating magic and gently put me down onto the ground. His wine robe billowed as he rushed over. When he asked if I was fine with a worried look, I nodded.
"The first part of our exam is done so what are you planning on doing, Shushu?"
Instead of a response, I gave Cory a ball-shaped item. It was the monster ball that I used on Hylli before. I had modified the monster ball that I had used on Hylli to increase our club's performance.
Cory stared at the magical trapping ball and stared with an odd expression on his face. It was a mix of interest and excitement.
"Is this the item that was related to our club project?"
"Yeah, I'll tell you how to use it."
When I tried to tell him how to use the monster ball, Cory looked at my signature on the ball, then asked.
"I'll try my best, so give it to me when you're done."
He was expressionless but still had a hint of excitement on his face as he looked at me. I found that kind of Cory cute and laughed.
"Sure, I'll give it to you. You can have it all."
When I patted his back and responded as such, Cory started to give me an excuse as he leered at me. Cory himself seemed to be kind of embarrassed–his ears were slightly red. There was a bit of hate in his expresson.
"…..it's only because the shape is pretty."
"I heard you, it's okay."
I told Cory how to use the magic ball.
Honestly, the instructions were so simple that there wasn't really much to tell, but I decided to show him how it worked. There was a slime coming our way at a very slow speed. I threw the ball at the slime. The slime went into the ball, resisted for a while, then a click sounded and everything grew quiet.
Cory stared at the scene for a moment, then stared at me in astonishment.
"You minimized the beast and stored it in that ball?"
"Yup."
"Is our club project….."
Cory couldn't continue his sentence. I continued it for him.
"Yeah, we're going to free these monsters on the Augran Mountain model that we built and learn about the different habits and living areas, along with their behavior patterns. People constantly had a hard time because nobody could figure out the monsters' patterns and constantly changing living areas, right? If we want a decent payment, I thought it would be a good idea to work on something that the kingdom has constantly had issues with."
Our model was almost exactly the same as the mountains now. We used a lot of nature magic to ensure that the model looked as realistic and natural as possible. If we released the monsters into the models, they probably wouldn't be able to tell.
It was also important to collect the slime king that Hylli had gone to collect to create the tiny slime monster village in our model. Slimes were very codependent monsters, so if they didn't live with their king, there wouldn't be a village: they would self-destruct.
The first part of the exam were slimes, and the second and third were yailon and lactonils. Then, we would have three different monster groups in our model. Then, we would be able to see their behavior patterns and it would be easier to create plans accordingly.
There would be some people who would say that they were low-level monsters, and there would be no reason to pick at them. But lower level monsters were usually food for the mid-class and high class monsters, so knowing where these monsters were would help us figure out where the higher level monsters were located. It wasn't exact, but learning about these monsters' behavior patterns would bring over an incredible change.
And if the school allowed us, we could catch and add in higher level monsters as well. Then we would have a cheat-sheet for all monster subjugations. We also had layers of protective circles so there was no way of escape for the monsters.
Cory quietly listened to all of my words, then smiled thinly. I could see the excitement in his green eyes.
"It's really fun when I'm around you."
Cory smiled and spoke with a gentle voice.
"It makes me wonder what I did before I met you."
Cory then headed away to work on what I had asked him to do for me. I paused to think as I thought about Cory's words about me being fun. I thought it was contradictory. Especially because he sounded genuine.
My entire life, all I had been told was that it was difficult to be together with me. Even in my past life, my friends constantly told me, "You're boring. I'm not playing with you." and similar statements. Of course, part of it was my fault. I had to take care of my younger siblings, so I never had time to play with my friends.
But even if that wasn't the case, because I never had the chance to relax, I didn't have the chance to learn humor and flexibility. If it wasn't a friend like Hestia, who I had grown up with, I had a difficult time talking with others. I didn't know how to carry on friendly conversations that weren't born out of necessity, and was jealous of my classmates who were witty and spoke well.
Even Hestia occasionally told me to smile more, talk more, to be a bit brighter in personality, but I couldn't tell her what I felt. Hestia honestly felt more like a younger sibling than a friend.
We didn't rely on each other. Hestia solely relied on me. She followed me as a daughter, almost. And in the midst of all that, Cory said that to me. I was a bit embarrassed, so I just rubbed the back of my head.
I stood still, no thoughts in my head. Hylli was calling me from afar. The king slime seemed surprised at its dead followers and tried to hide, but was currently pinned on the ground by the prince's sword.
When I approached Hylli, he looked towards me with a proud look on his face. His red eyes seemed to be begging for praise, so I patted his back a few times.
When I took the monster ball out of my pocket, Hylli's expression changed into something more cautious.
"Hey, look. Why are you suddenly taking that out? I did as you asked."
Hylli despised the monster ball because of his memory of being trapped in one. He seemed to think that I was going to use it on him, so he seemed really scared. He looked at me with stiff shoulders.. I found that cute, so I just gave him a mean smile with my hand holding the monster ball raised upwards.
"I know. Just stay still."
"I-I refuse! What is happening! Why are you doing this?!"
Hylli couldn't seem to give up on the slime he had captured, so he was stuck holding his sword pinned down as he panicked. He looked at me with a victimized look.
I pretended to throw the monster ball at Hylli, who was staring at me with a fearful gaze. He closed his eyes and hunched in.
But when nothing happened after time had passed, Hylli peeked open one eye.
When he saw me clear as day, he seemed to be surprised.
"If I capture you after knowing of your identity, that would be an offense to the royal family."
Hylli stared at me with wide eyes, then noticed that the slime he had captured had disappeared.
"...has it been added to your godforsaken collection."
Hylli asked, frowning. I shrugged my shoulders as I smiled. I didn't know for sure. I didn't know if my 'Image Shooter' worked well. I didn't know.
Hylli kept quiet for a while. Then, when he held his head back up, he seemed to be back to normal.
"Well, that's fine. I also have a few photos of you."
"...!"
Hylli attempted to counterattack. He had the scene of me singing last time in a memory device and was carrying it around. Moreover, he also had photos of me with ugly expressions, drenched in sweat during out swordsmanship practice. Well, it was weaker than Hylli's embarrassing past.
When I glared at Hylli, Hylli glared right back.
The first, second, and third parts of the monster subjugation went well.
I carried a large amount of monster balls in my multi-dimensional pocket. Of course, thanks to Cory's massacre magic, our grades were good too. My magic just wasn't as powerful as his, so I could only hide myself behind Cory.
Hylli tried his best throughout the exam to capture the various monster bosses and had captured and beat them all up. None of my precious efforts had been wasted.
The long, long test ended towards the end of the afternoon classes. The prince headed to the dorms to wash off the slime blood, and only Cory and I remained.
Now that it was free time I could do anything I wanted, but I was thinking about organizing the monster balls before going back to my dorm and playing around with Hazel. I dragged Cory, who was on his way back to relax, back to our club room. Cory let himself be dragged along.
When we arrived in our club room, I released all the monsters in the balls inside of the model.
I tried my best to remember where we had captured them, and released them near those locations. The monsters seemed surprised at first, but soon started to act normally. The monsters seemed to recognize each other and soon joined their groups. That was pretty cool.
I used a magic circle to create a fake sky and environment, then created a large protective circle around it. And now, a monster farm was created.
From now on, we would just have to observe these monsters and create statements about them.
"Shushu."
I was staring at my monster farm, pleased, when Cory called my name.
I was hunched over on the floor because the monster farm was located there. When I turned my head, Cory was sitting next to me, hunched over as well.
"Don't look at me, look in front of you."
Face half-buried behind his hands, Cory spoke. I followed his instructions and looked away and at the monster farm in front of me. Cory turned his body towards me, then put a finger near my hair.
Shocked by the sudden touch, I tried to look back at him. Cory spoke with a sullen tone.
"I said don't look."
I looked in front of me again. I could feel Cory fight next to me. He was so close that I could hear his breathing. He smelled like candy. What was this kid going to do? I was curious, so I kept trying to peek as I looked in front of me.
Cory put the hair that was curtained around me behind my ear. He smiled when I flinched at his cold hand. When he found my ear that was hiding behind my hair, he began taking something out of his pocket. After some rustling, he took the thing from his pocket towards my ear.
I could feel something cold near my ear. Then, when Cory took his hand off, I could feel an unfamiliar weight on my ear.